


two minute minors

by rookiesinlove



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Bookstore, Dancing, Established Relationship, M/M, Multi, Pre-Slash, Weddings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-25
Updated: 2016-03-25
Packaged: 2018-05-29 00:09:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6351031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rookiesinlove/pseuds/rookiesinlove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tumblr ficlets</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1988 - Twihard with a Vengeance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From a tumblr post of ‘AUs for when your otp are both assholes’: **I asked for your help getting a book off the top shelf and you laughed at my taste and called me a ~~nerd~~ Twihard so I shoved you into a table of nonfiction best-sellers and that’s how we both got banned from the ~~quirky community~~ bookstore AU**

“Hey, can you give me hand here?”

The guy over in the YA section probably qualifies as a young adult, but he doesn’t exactly fit the parade of teenagers Jonny usually expects to see in that corner of the store. He’s probably Jonny’s age, maybe a little younger, wearing a huge baggy hoodie and immaculate Nike sneakers. He has lingering acne, riotously curly blond hair, and earnest blue eyes. He’s pretty small for a guy too; Jon has at least four inches on him, and that’s why he apparently needs Jon’s help.

“Sure,” Jonny says. “What’s up?”

“Uh, yeah,” the guy says, “’Up’ is right. Can you get Breaking Dawn down for me? I can’t reach.”

He shrugs a bit pathetically and gives Jonny doe eyes.

The big new hardcovers of Stephanie Meyer’s latest atrocity are arranged face out on the top shelves. Jonny is pretty sure the guy could probably reach if he stretched, but maybe that would be too undignified or something.

Jonny ambles over. He grabs one off the shelf, easy as anything, and thrusts it into the guy’s hand.

“I don’t know why you’d want to read that crap anyway,” Jonny says.

The popular science display in the middle of the aisle has caught his eye, and he’s distracted trying to determine the cursive title of Jared Diamond’s latest from ten feet away.

“Excuse me?” the guy says. “I think you’ll find that Ms Meyer is an _artist_ and this is undoubtedly her magnum opus. Maybe it’s _you_ who has no taste.”

Jonny turns back to the guy incredulously. “Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

Jonny blinks.

“Don’t knock it, man,” the guy insists. “My sisters took me to see the film and now I’m hooked.”

“Oh your sisters, eh?” Jonny says. “You sure it’s not just because you’re secretly a teenage girl yourself? Do you write fanfiction?”

The guy’s eyes widen. “Fuck you,” he hisses.

“ _Twihard_ ,” Jonny says mockingly.

The guy, when he moves, moves _really fucking fast._

Jonny doesn’t see him coming. Before he even registers the movement, he’s sprawling backwards into the science display, one of the guy’s hands gripped in the placket of Jonny’s polo shirt. Jonny struggles, flailing. He ends up with his hand against the other guy’s face, trying to use his longer reach to shove him off and let Jonny up. Books are flying everywhere.

“Take that back,” the guy is saying through Jonny’s hand.

“Never,” Jonny snarls.

He pushes harder, and the guy bites down on Jon’s finger.

Jonny yelps in alarm and jerks underneath him. Surprisingly, it is that, and not any of Jonny’s actual fighting effort, that unbalances the guy and sends them both sprawling to the floor. They lie there for a moment, dazed and stunned.

The guy ended up mostly on top of Jon, pressing him down into the musty shop carpet. He’s surprisingly solid, for such a slight dude: broad, chunky shoulders and a hardened physique disguised by his baggy hoodie. Jonny finds himself uncomfortably aware of the firm muscle and the harsh breathing in his ear; the last time he’d been in this close proximity to a guy, it’d been three weeks ago with a hot dude he’d managed to pick up at a sports bar. That dude was taller than this guy, but nearly as broad, with the same firmness to his frame that made for a great handhold while he was fucking Jonny. This guy would probably be the same… and that is really not a good train of thought while trapped under a complete stranger in public. Jonny squirms uncomfortably.

Jonny has a hardcover digging into the small of his back. The guy’s hard-won copy of Breaking Dawn is on the floor a few feet away, dustjacket askew.

“What the fuck,” Jonny says flatly. He shoves at the guy’s shoulder.

“You started it,” the guy grumbles. “I thought the customer was always right, asshole.”

Jonny frowns up at the guy. “I don’t work here,” he says slowly.

The guy’s eyes widen again, in a curious mixture of surprise and guilt. They’re darker now, big black pupils ringed with ocean blue. Maybe it’s the angle or the lighting or something. “But your shirt…”

Jonny looks down reflexively. He’s wearing chinos and a plain black polo shirt… that’s nearly exactly the same as the style worn by the employees here. Okay, maybe in hindsight a pretty understandable mistake to make.

“Hey!” someone is shouting. “Do you two mind?”

An employee is standing over them, brandishing a broom. Two other customers are hovering a few yards away, pretending not to gawk.

“Break it up,” the employee says. “I don’t want this in my shop. Get out.” He waves the broom menacingly.

The guy scrambles up off Jonny. Jonny heaves himself up after him and they beat feet out the door, muttering apologies.

“And don’t come back!” the employee shouts after them.

They’re left standing, sore and shell-shocked, outside the bookstore. Jonny does a mental inventory of damage done: bitten finger (bleeding), bruised tailbone (probably), dignity in tatters (definitely).

“Um,” the guy says. “Sorry about that.”

Jonny snorts. “You started it.”

“I did not!” the guy says hotly. “You insulted my _honour_ , asshole.”

“You bit me!” Jonny exclaims, holding out his injured finger. “You really are a vampire, aren’t you.”

The guy looks at his finger consideringly. “If I were a vampire, you’d have a lot more to worry about than a little bite like that.” Face falling, he continues, “And I didn’t even get to buy my book.”

Jonny does actually feel a bit bad about that.

“Listen,” Jonny says slowly, “It’s kinda my fault you didn’t get your book.”

“It’s _definitely_ your fault,” the guy interjects.

“Okay,” Jonny concedes. “And I am sorry…”

“Make it up to me,” the guy jumps in. “With coffee.”

“Uh, what?” Jonny says.

He was planning to make his peace and leave, but if this weirdo wants to stick around, he can roll with that. And everyone knows coffee is a euphemism, so maybe the guy is less pissed off with him than he thought. Jonny can be the bigger person here.

“Buy me coffee,” the guy insists. “I’d make you buy me a book to fill the void in my broken heart, but that’s too much to hope for.”

He grins, sheepishly.

He has a nice smile, Jonny realises dumbly. And his eyes really are very blue.

“Coffee,” Jonny says.

“Coffee,” the guy repeats. “Or whatever, I’m not fussy.” With another quicksilver smile, he adds, “You can lecture me more on my terrible taste in books.”

Jonny stares. Suddenly the images he had repressed while sprawled on the floor come flooding back: this guy, cute and blond with the broadest shoulders Jonny has ever seen on a guy this size – and Jonny doesn’t even know his name yet for fuck’s sake – on top of him, pressing him down into a bed or a couch or, hell, even a more comfortable floor, fucking him open, making him shout and hiss in pleasure instead of pain and annoyance…

He stops abruptly, wondering if any of his thought process is showing on his face.

From the guy’s widening grin, he’d guess that’s probably a yes.

“So, coffee?” the guy says again. He’s laughing now, a flash of pink tongue visible between his teeth.

“Coffee,” Jonny says, more determined this time. “I know a place round here, unless you’ve got somewhere in mind.”

“Nope,” the guy says, “I’m easy.”

“Hi easy, I’m Jonny,” Jonny quips reflexively.

The guy laughs out loud, a bright surprised sound bursting out of him. Jonny colours slightly.

“It’s Patrick,” the guy says.

“Patrick the Twihard,” Jonny says, teasingly. “I can remember that.”

“Ugh, you really are an asshole, aren’t you,” Patrick says. “I really do have sisters, and they really will fuck you up if you don’t treat me nice.”

“Oh, I’m _treating_ you now, am I?” Jonny says.

“You bet,” Patrick says. “Shower me with affection to make up for being a massive douche.” Then, to Jonny’s mixed horror and arousal, he leers atrociously, “Or shower me with something, anyway.”

Jonny tries and fails to hide an incredulous smile. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. Also you have to stop saying that, otherwise I’m gonna start calling you Mr Serious,” Patrick replies.

When their wrists knock together as they walk, the temptation to take Patrick’s hand is sudden, visceral and overwhelming. He looks at Patrick, the way his face is ducked to hide a warm flush of exertion, the little cut next to his bushy eyebrow caused by Jonny’s pathetic flailing earlier, the tousle of his hair, and thinks to himself _fuck it_.

Jonny takes his hand, and tries not to grin when, in his peripheral vision, he sees Patrick’s small contented smile.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted [here](http://rookiesinlove.tumblr.com/post/130817984309/i-came-across-a-post-of-aus-for-when-your-otp-are)


	2. 721988 - in which dry-erase boards are Jonny's friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pre-721988, established Kane/Toews making overtures to Panarin, set (and first posted) in late October 2015

Practice the day after the game sees the second line ripping it up _again._ Kaner has clicked with Arty and Pan as smoothly as he and Jonny did with Sharpy, back when they were the rookies – and that seems like so fucking long ago that Jonny’s head hurts. It was the eighth anniversary of his debut on Saturday, not that he managed to put up any points to celebrate it. It’s getting on Jonny’s nerves, even though they’re only three games into the season. He and Hoss have been same-old, same-old, and Q’s plan to rotate all the young guys willing to play left wing through the so-called lottery position is more than a little frustrating, particularly when the line blender kicks in _between shifts_.

Jonny leans back against the boards, having taken his first turn on the shooting drill. Tikhonov is next to him, chin resting on his stick, a curious pensive expression on his face as they watch Kaner and Pan laughing at each other on the other side of the rink.

“They don’t even speak the same fucking language,” Jonny grumbles.

He barely realises he spoke aloud until Tikhonov hums in agreement.

“Like nothing I’ve ever seen,” Tikhonov says. “Some guys just click, I guess.”

Jonny shrugs. He and Kaner used to be like that. Sometimes they still are – like that insane no-look one-timer they pulled off in Brooklyn, the sort of move that makes Jonny instantly dry-mouthed and half-hard – but it happens less and less often these days. They’ve both long since given up hope of being back on the same line in any permanent capacity.

“Artemi likes him,” Tikhonov continues. “He really looks up to him.”

“Kaner’ll teach him a lot, that’s for sure,” Jonny says. “He always was good with the rookies.”

“I think it’s more than that,” Tikhonov says, slightly cryptically. He gives Jonny a significant glance that Jon doesn’t know how to interpret, then barrels off down the ice to join Bicks and Teuvo.

Jonny is left pondering that bizarre interlude alone.

Panarin puts in two in quick succession. First he bamboozling Darls with a five-hole at astonishing speed, before circling back round to come in for his second. Tossing a snarky grin to his audience, he pulls out Kaner’s sick kicks, dekeing and dangling before putting over Darls, top shelf, glove side. A straggling chorus of cheers greets that manoeuvre, and when he skates back over to Kaner, Pan is rewarded with a disgustingly huge bright smile and a helmet tap.

“Great job,” Patrick is saying. Using his hands, he mimics the swerving path of Pan’s deke with an approving smile. “We’ll teach you the Spin-o-rama next.”

Panarin may not understand the words – although at this point, he probably gets the gist of it – but he’s nodding and beaming back at Kaner anyway. The two of them are a fucking picture: sweaty and smiling, with those ridiculous matching curls peeking out beneath their helmets. Jonny tosses his water bottle away slightly more violently than he meant to, and goes to take his own shot.

He misses, because of fucking course he does.

After that, Jonny has a meeting with Q and Kitch to go over their strategy for the Flyers, so when he gets back to the locker room, the Icehouse is practically empty.

Except for Kaner’s line.

They’re sitting around Panarin’s stall, Kaner in the middle with a white board and dry erase pen, Arty on one side, translating any of the trickier words and techniques to Panarin, who is craning over Kaner’s like an angel on his shoulder, all wide eyes and perfect curls.

Jonny storms into the locker room in a clatter, suddenly annoyed and wanting to make his presence felt, even knowing as he does it that it’s a dick move.

Kaner looks up anyway, and smiles at him.

“Hey, Tazer,” he calls. “Come have a look at this.”

Jonny never could say no to him.

He lets Patrick run through the plays again, and Jonny is not surprised to learn it’s a work of strategic genius. Patrick is a student of hockey history and a master of statistics: it’s not unusual for him to have the better of any team’s D simply by virtue of going through so much tape he practically inhales it. It plays to their strengths, the light, fleet-footed wingers weaving through all but the quickest of defensemen, and Arty doing what always used to be Jonny’s job – using his ample assets (Patrick grins and winks at Jonny when he says this, and Panarin looks between them wide-eyed with something like wonder) to maintain a net-front presence and block the goalie’s sightlines.

Jonny gives it his approval. “Run it by Q, dude,” he says. “I’m sure he’ll give it the go-ahead.”

Patrick shrugs. He and Q have never exactly seen eye to eye – the trauma of Savvy’s departure saw to that – but they have enough professional respect that Jonny only has to mediate on the worst days.

Patrick wipes the whiteboard clean with a sweaty sock, which he then tosses toward the laundry. With a grimace, Jonny reclaims the board, but not before Pat can scribble a quick dick in the corner, grinning.

“Remind me again what birthday you have coming up,” Jonny deadpans. “Your seventh, right?”

Patrick gives him the finger.

Arty and Pan have retreated to their own corner of the locker room. In the Icehouse, as at the UC, the Russian clique have claimed the three stalls in the back corner of the room, a combination of privacy and isolationist policy that does give Jonny the barest pause. He hasn’t ever had to captain Russians before, and he knows from lurid anecdotes from elsewhere in the league that too much seclusion can lead to schisms. Still, for the moment he allows them this.

Panarin is babbling something at Anisimov. He looks bug-eyed and amazed when he glances furtively back across the room at Jonny. Arty nods and replies with something else that makes Pan’s eyes widen even further.

Jonny pretends not to see. He pulls his Under Armour off hastily to go take a shower. Kaner is only four steps behind, but they know better than to do anything more than exchange warm, slightly appreciative glances as they soap up and rinse off. The time that Sharpy and Seabs interrupted them was scarring enough that they vowed never to start shit in the locker room ever again.

When Jonny gets back, the white board is where he left it, propped against the side of his holdall. Pan and Arty have already left.

“Lunch, right?” Patrick is saying. “I know you wanted to take me to that new stupid health food deli or whatever the fuck it is.”

“Yeah,” Jonny says distractedly. He pulls his street clothes back on and shoves the whiteboard into his bag.

 

It’s not until Jonny gets home - late in the afternoon, after lunch followed by lazy sex on Patrick’s couch - that he finds the message.

 **19 <3 88???** is written in smudged dry erase on the whiteboard. Beneath it, almost tentatively small, is **72 :)**

Jonny’s heart stops.

Is this… is this what Tikhonov was insinuating earlier? Is this the source of Pan’s awe and Arty’s amused commentary? Is Pan’s adoration of Kaner more than hero worship, has it perhaps tipped across an undrawn line, over to actual attraction? And… and how does Jonny fit into this?

“Fuck,” Jonny breathes.

He erases the questions marks and writes **yes** very clearly underneath. For good measure, he draws a big heart around both numbers. (After all, if Panarin is only interested in Patrick, he has to stake his claim.) Then, he rubs out the 72 and writes it in again, bigger this time, and adds an arrow from it to the centre of the heart. Next to the arrow he adds a fresh string of question marks. At morning skate he'll leave it in Pan’s stall for the rookie to find.

Surely he can understand the invitation implied by that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted [here](http://rookiesinlove.tumblr.com/post/131697507004/who-wants-some-pre-721988-established-kanetoews)


	3. 1988 - Some Things Were Meant to Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pat and Jonny's first dance at their wedding. Originally intended as an eventual sequel to [life after deadspin](archiveofourown.org/works/5271335), set a year later.

“Time for dancing, boys,” Erica says with barely restrained glee.

Jonny looks from sister-in-law to sister-in-law, his sense of dread growing exponentially. He and Patrick discussed this, obviously, but there is a very big difference between the sort of dancing they usually do – exuberant white-boy dancing, the Kaner shuffle, the occasional grind – and the dancing expected of them tonight.

Their _wedding_ night. God. Fuck. Jonny still can’t quite believe it.

Patrick seems less daunted than Jonny. He jumps up almost straight away, open-mouthed grin with a hint of tongue. He gives a quick shimmy of his shoulders, briefly threatening to do the shuffle. Jonny is slower to move, but after only a token protest, he takes Pat’s hand willingly and allows himself to be dragged onto the empty dancefloor.

“What are you planning?” he murmurs in Patrick’s ear as they assume the position.

Patrick shrugs one shoulder and beams up at him. “Nothing,” he says, “Just happy.”

Jon has to smile helplessly at that. He is so incredibly happy; not even the thought of having to dance in front of all his family, friends, teammates and acquaintances can dull that bubbly feeling inside that has nothing to do with the champagne.

“Yeah,” Jonny says instead, “Me too babe.”

Patrick bites his lip before kissing him quickly. There are a few whoops. Someone shouts, “Get on with it!”

They glance over to the DJ who gives them a thumbs up. After a beat, gentle guitar strains start up, and a familiar crooning voice begins.

_Wise men say only fools rush in, but I can’t help falling in love with you_

Elvis wasn’t what Jonny had expected, when Patrick told him what he wanted to have their first dance to. Pat’s musical taste is eclectic, but generally runs in the vein of annoyingly bouncy pop and hip-hop. Jon prefers alternative and indie stuff, but to be honest, he’ll listen to anything that will occupy his mind and help him get his focus entirely on the ice, get his head into the zone.

This is a different sort of zone entirely.

Jonny rests his hands low and possessive on Patrick’s back. Patrick is so solid in his arms; Jonny can almost feel the coiled elastic power of his lats through his suit. He has bulked up since the end of the playoffs, with a summer glow that makes him look golden and angelic in the low lights of the dancefloor. He’s pretty damn captivating, and Jonny can’t take his eyes off him.

“We should have done this years ago,” Jonny says.

Patrick leans in so they’re dancing cheek to cheek, slow and sedate. Jonny thinks immediately of all the hugs that they’ve shared on the ice. All the times they’ve had to restrain themselves, the times when they couldn’t let people know just how much they mean to each other, and how that’s all over now. It’s an exhilarating feeling.

“Maybe,” Patrick admits. “But then we wouldn’t be here now.” With an impish grin, he sings along for a few bars, “ _Darling so it goes, some things were meant to be.”_

Jonny rolls his eyes reflexively and kisses the shell of Patrick’s ear.

“You’re ridiculous,” he murmurs.

“Yep,” Patrick says, popping the p loudly. “But you love me.”

“I really do.”

Patrick clutches the back of Jonny’s tux slightly tighter and clings. The team has joked, in the past, that they look like they’re trying to fuse themselves together when they hug. Jonny wouldn’t mind it: to be part of the same being as Patrick, eternally entwined.

Then again, maybe that’s what marriage is going to be like.

“I’m going to fuck you into the mattress later,” Patrick whispers. “Maybe eat you out first. Make you beg for it.”

Jonny chokes. When he recovers, Patrick is laughing at him, tongue peeking out from between his teeth.

“Really?” Jonny says incredulously, “Now?”

Patrick’s grin widens. His hand slips further down, indiscreetly, and a few sudden catcalls cut through the illusion of privacy. The song ended and they didn’t even notice.

Patrick instantly blushes furiously, but, Jonny notices with intense amusement, doesn’t actually withdraw his hand.

“I think that’s our cue,” Andrée says suddenly. She and Donna rise from the top table simultaneously and cross the dancefloor.

Jonny sinks his head onto Patrick’s shoulder.

“Kill me,” he groans.

“Later,” Patrick says. “Dance now.”

“Come on, mon chère,” Andrée says.

Jonny takes his mother’s hand. Patrick and Donna arrange themselves a few feet away. Jonny let Pat take charge of the music from here on, so he doesn’t really notice what’s playing as he and his mom dance.

“I’m so happy for you,” Andrée says quietly. “Both of you.”

“Thanks, maman,” Jonny mumbles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted [here](http://rookiesinlove.tumblr.com/post/141254074059/thelittlestagemanager-dudedevon).


End file.
